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Biography

JP Buntinx – Biography

Starting my biography about the part before I got into writing is a bit moot, so if you ever have any questions about it, just let me know.

I got involved in Bitcoin and other digital currencies through a colleague when I was still working at IPG Group N.V. in Hasselt. During one bus ride home, he started talking about this “new and innovative online payment method” called Bitcoin. After googling the term Bitcoin, I finally stumbled upon the Bitcointalk forums in 2011, and I have been hooked ever since. In fact, I managed to achieve “Legendary” status on BitcoinTalk, for what that is worth. I’m not someone who cares about titles, status, or any of that nonsense. All of the information I gathered over the years is invaluable, and I am grateful to everyone who shared their vision with me.

When my job at IPG Group N.V. ended – perhaps one of the best moments in my professional career, in hindsight – I started getting more involved in cryptocurrency, and how it all worked. Personally, I have always been drawn to technology in general – computers, smart devices, The internet connectivity, the whole shebang – and Bitcoin seemed to be a perfect fit at that time. It didn’t take long until I started to develop my own opinion about the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and after asking around a bit, I found someone willing to let me write an article to see if I was any good at it.

My first post I ever made as an author – which was on the now defunct CryptoNerd website – was horrible. Paragraphs were two lines long, at maximum. Images? Nope, we don’t know how to do that at all. Spell checking and punctuality? Well..Maybe….Ok, not really. But it was fun, the site owner had a lot of work fixing some mistakes and setting up the layout, but eventually, my article went live. As you would come to expect, only a handful of people ever read it. But I got paid a whole Litecoin back then – which was worth next to nothing – but I converted it to Bitcoin anyway.

As a side note, I would like to state – for the record – that I never bought or invested in Bitcoin through trading. All of the bitcoins I have earned since 2013 have come through writing, forum signatures on Bitcointalk, and running my own website.

My stint at CryptoNerd lasted for a few months, although I never published that much content. Although it was a very fun learning experience, I still wasn’t sure whether or not writing articles was something for me. To this day, I’m still not entirely sure, but people enjoy reading my content, so I must be doing something right, I guess. Either way, once my interest for altcoins was piqued, I started becoming more active as a writer and even started submitting altcoin news to other sites, such as CryptoSource, and even CryptoCoinsNews (this was all in 2013).

The year 2013 came and went, and I suddenly felt the urge to start my own cryptocurrency blog. I honed my writing skills, even though there is still a lot of room for improvement, but together with a life-long friend, we started CryptoArticles. Truth be told, we didn’t have a proper plan for the site at that time, other than writing tons of content and see where it would take us. By saying “tons of content,” I mean tons…of…content. We had days during which we wrote and published a combined 25 articles, although the daily average was around 10-12 for nearly nine months straight.

Our first bit of recognition came in March of 2014 when I was invited to attend the Bitcoin 2014 Conference in Amsterdam. Since I was unemployed and got a free ticket to attend the two-day conference, I decided to head to Amsterdam and see what this was all about. Attending your first Bitcoin conference is a magical feeling. Here you are, in a group of over 1,000 people with the same interest and excitement as you, and talking about something we are all passionate about. The food was great, the people were even greater, and eventually, I didn’t get to write a single article during my stay. But that didn’t really matter; I was hooked, and Bitcoin writing would be my career path, no matter what.

During the remainder of 2014, I was fortunate enough to attend several more Bitcoin events. CoinSummit 2014, Inside Bitcoins London 2014, and BTC2B in Brussels. To keep things going on a social level, I also got interested in the Belgian Bitcoin Association, a group of like-minded people from all aspects of life, with the same passion as myself. On a professional level, I started writing on a freelance basis for various news outlets, including a brief stint at CoiNTeelgraph, and Bitcoinist, for whom I still write to this very day.

A major change took place in 2015 when the co-owner of CryptoArticles and myself were approached by a group of people who wanted to buy CryptoArticles. After working out a successful business deal, we agreed to the sale and rebranded the website to Digital Money Times. Part of the agreement included they would hire me as well, and I would do my best to help the site grow. This was not an easy task, as there was a lot of competition out there, and reporting on just Bitcoin news wasn’t feasible anymore. As a writer, you also have to keep evolving to keep up with the current trends. In my case, I started looking into writing hybrid articles, combining the world of Bitcoin, Technology, Finance, Fintech, and Blockchain Technology.

Fast forward to today, and I am writing for some of the top cryptocurrency news sites in existence today. But I am still hungry and ambitious for more. Some people might say my ambition is limitless, and they are probably right. Writing has gone from a hobby to passion, to a full-time self-employed job come January 2016. And you can rest assured, it won’t end there either. Unlike most people, I will continue to improve myself, make new connections, meet new people, and expand my online presence. Who knows, maybe we’ll run into each other at a conference or a Meetup some day.